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He wasn’t prepared for that, and whenever anyone blindsided him with the subject, it always took a second or two to steady himself. For a fraction of time, a picture of Janie flashed into his mind. It was more than a picture, really. There was the scent of gunpowder, the sting as one of the bullets crashed deep into the muscle of his thigh, the sound of Janie’s soft cry, the red haze of blood that spattered as she fell. And then he closed it off again. He always did. He never thought about Janie in front of people. He saved that for when he was alone.
“Sorry,” he said, shaking his head. “Nothing that romantic.” Grinning, he gave her car a slap. “Get on home. A storm’s coming up.”
She gave him one last smile, full of regret, and took off toward her house. Rafe chuckled as he walked on over and got into his car. There was no way he would ever touch that girl, but he had to admit, her little crush on him was good for the old ego.
The tires crunched on the new-fallen snow, and he knew when he got up a little higher, the precipitation was really going to get thick. Good thing he still had on his snow tires. This late in the season, he hadn’t expected another storm before the full spring thaw. But even snow tires were not going to take him all the way to the Santos place if he didn’t hurry.
Turning up toward the mountain, he traveled quickly on a road that hadn’t seen many cars that day. Three years in this area and he still wasn’t used to it—the peace—the wonderful peace. It was the ultimate contrast to the rest of his life. Down in Los Angeles, he’d been a cop in a department under siege—the gang fights, the drive-by shootings, the hatred, the resentments.
There was no hatred up here in Clear Creek. Not that things were perfect. But here, people dealt with each other one-on-one, with some understanding, some willingness to compromise. No one was staking out territory. It was a brand-new world for him, a world he had grown to love. Sure, compared to L.A., it was boring. And that was the way he liked it.
His car climbed high on the winding mountain road and he checked out the Santos place, securing locks on the gates, then started back down, anticipating his bed. Just as he came to the crossroads, something caught his eye—a light, high up on the old forest road.
“Damn,” he breathed, watching it as it moved. Someone was up there, and that road was closed. It looked as if he weren’t going to make it home as quickly as he’d thought. In fact, he might just be looking at a very long night.
Turning his car back up, he headed toward the gatecrasher, and his mood was less than cheery.
She was lost. It had to be near midnight and the snow was getting worse. And she was lost.
This was crazy. She was crazy. Who expected snow this close to spring? But why had she taken that shortcut, anyway? Here she was in the mountains of New Mexico, looking for angles, just like always.
And getting in trouble because of it. That was just like always, too.
What on earth was she doing out here in the wilderness, anyway? She was a city girl, born and bred. She knew all there was to know about navigating the freeways and alleyways of Southern California. She knew very little about icy mountain roads.
She hadn’t seen another car for an hour. For all she knew, she’d driven right out of civilization and into the twilight zone. She let out a small shriek as the car skidded and came to rest turned broadside. Her pulse was beating like a drum as she straightened out her car. Was she going to have to pull over and wait for morning?
Her heart lurched as lights appeared in her rearview mirror. Another human being! Hallelujah.
But then a red light began to flash behind her. The cops. She groaned, half laughing. Every bit of good news had bad news tacked onto it tonight. If he was going to give her a ticket out here in the middle of nowhere…
She pulled over and turned off her engine, sighing, then watched in her mirror as he slowly got out of the police car behind her, holding on to his hat as a vicious gust of wind tried to take it. He looked big and grouchy. Just her luck.
“Hello, Officer,” she said brightly, rolling down her window as he approached the driver’s side of the car. She winced as snowflakes hit her nose with a sting. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to see a friendly face. Where am I, anyway?”
Ignoring the question, his dark eyes made a quick inventory of the interior of her car. “Where do you think you’re going?” he asked, all business.
She hesitated. On this road? Absolutely nowhere. “To a baby shower in Denver,” she said aloud. “Am I going the wrong way?”
Something about the set of his chin told her she wasn’t going to get an answer to that question.
“May I see your license, please?” he intoned evenly.
She swallowed. Not a ticket, on top of everything else. “What was I doing?” she asked, putting off the inevitable.
His dark face didn’t respond in kind to her friendly smile, but he did tell her what he thought. “Driving like an idiot,” he noted calmly.
Her smile became a little more strained. “Have they got a special number in the vehicle code for that now?”
His bland look darkened into a frown. Obviously he wasn’t in the mood for light repartee. “Let me see your license, please,” he repeated, his voice just a shade more steely.
“Okay.” She sighed, resigned. “My license.” She reached onto the floor beside her seat where she always kept her purse. Her hand didn’t contact anything familiar. “Just a second.” She reached under the seat, then looked behind it. A tiny flare of panic began to lick at her throat. Where the heck was her purse?
“Wait a minute. I can’t find my purse,” she said.
“Interesting,” he murmured dryly.
She glanced at him, caught by something in his tone. “No, really, I have it. It’s here somewhere.”
But she still couldn’t find it. Oh, brother. Now what? She thought back quickly. She’d made a stop about three miles ago when the snow had begun to blind her. She’d taken out her map to see if she was on the right road, then had gone back to the trunk to see if there were any chains hiding there. At one point, she’d thought she sensed something falling out into the swirling snow, but when she’d looked she hadn’t seen it again. Now she knew—it must have been her purse falling out of the car.
She gasped. “Oh, my God. I must have knocked it out along the road back about three miles,” she told him. Twisting, she looked at the darkened road and had a quick flashback to a child’s fairy tale, complete with witches and goblins hiding in the shapes of trees. “I…I’ll have to run back and take a look.”
His face didn’t change. “No,” he said firmly.
She blinked at his impassive look. She wasn’t used to this kind of unsympathetic opposition. It did tend to put her back up.
“What do you mean, no? My purse is back there. Someone might pick it up. All my money and my credit cards are in there.”
The cynical glint in his dark eyes deepened. “Listen, lady,” he said evenly. “Don’t bother to try a con on me. I’ve heard them all.”
A con? She almost smiled. She was the last person to try to con anyone. Most of her friends thought she was much too open and forthright as it was. But she kind of liked being thought of as a latent con artist. Still, this was the police. She probably ought to take him seriously.
“Well, I can’t prove who I am,” she told him brightly, pushing back her thick, curly hair with a casual motion that came to her naturally…and often. “But I can tell you, and you’re just going to have to take my word for it. Cami Bishop, from Marina Del Rey, California.”
His mouth twisted. He’d obviously noted her pushing back her hair and thought it an affectation that might even border on flirting. The set of his mouth told her he didn’t succumb to flirting. “A swinging California single, no doubt,” he said, almost sneering.
She squinted, trying to see him better. In the dark, with his hat pulled down low, all she could really make out was a hard mouth cut like a slash in granite and a pair of dark eyes that were colder than the icy wind that was making periodic raids on their position. She hesitated. Something about this man could give a girl chills.
“That’s a bit of an exaggeration,” she said, then tried one last grin. “But basically, yes.” And even at that, she couldn’t get a smile out of him. Oh well. “Anyway, I’m on my way to this baby shower…”
“Hold it.” Cocking his hat back, he stared at her for a long moment, then drew away from her window abruptly, as though he’d just thought of something, something that startled him.
“What?” She blinked at him, surprised.
“Just hold on.” he told her sternly, “I’ll get back to you.”
Rolling up her window to keep the snow out, she lifted her gaze to the rearview mirror to watch him walk to his patrol car, stamping his boots to clear a path. Why did these guys always seem to swagger? She supposed it was meant to make peons like her stay in line. Too bad. Lines and boundaries had never been her forte.
In a moment, he was back, and she only rolled down the window a crack this time. After all, there was a limit to the amount of snow she was going to let the wind whip in around her. It was freezing and she had no heavy coat.
Why she’d left Santa Fe in only this medium-weight linen suit was a question she would be asking herself later on, along with many others—such as, what sort of an idiot had she been to brave the mountains on a night like this? But that was all waiting for the moment when this trip was over and she would have the luxury of second thoughts and incredulous comments. For now, basic survival seemed more important.
“Get out of the car,” he said, his voice hard and authoritative.
“What?” She squinted, trying to see him better. He sounded meaner than before. And here she’d been hoping for a thaw in their relationship. “It’s snowing!”
“Get out of the car,” he ordered grimly, “face it, and spread your arms out.”
And that was when she noticed he had his gun drawn.
Her heart leapt into her throat. Suddenly things seemed very serious indeed. “What are you doing?” she gasped, staring down the black muzzle of the weapon.
“Get out of the car, face it, and spread your arms out.”
She swallowed hard. He had a bad habit of repeating himself, but she wasn’t about to call him on it now. For one split second, she considered starting up her engine and driving off as though all this had never happened. But that gun was just too ominous. And the snow was just too heavy. And most of all, his face was just too hard and cold.
“Okay,” she said hoarsely. “Just a minute. I’m getting out.”
She put her hands up so he could see she had nothing in them. Wasn’t that what they always did on TV? Then she stepped out, her soft leather shoes sliding a bit on the sleetcovered blacktop. She looked at him questioningly, shivering with the cold, and he gestured for her to turn.
“Spread your arms,” he said softly, but his softer tone seemed even more chilling and she complied quickly, gasping again as he stepped up close behind her and reached out to pat down her sides.
“This is insane,” she said sharply, pulling away from his touch.
“Hold still,” he ordered, taking control of her by the back of the neck the way a cat might a kitten. “And listen carefully to your rights. You have the right to remain silent…”
She shook her head slowly as he went down the list he was obliged to give her. He was arresting her. This was surreal. It couldn’t be happening. She’d just been driving along, on her way to Denver to see old friends and have a jolly time celebrating her college roommate’s new baby. That all seemed innocent enough, didn’t it? Just exactly when had she stepped out of the real world and into this wonderland where everything was upside-down?
It was all so strange. There was a break in the wind, and snow was falling in tiny, glittering flakes, falling silently all around, hitting her face with small, frosty impacts and melting there. It had been years since she’d even seen snow, not since her college days in Northern California, when they’d all packed up the car and headed for the mountains to try out the ski lifts. It always made her marvel how the snow could change the landscape in such a short time and never make a sound. It was like magic—as though some wizard had waved a wand and transformed everything when no one was looking. An enchanted episode.
And so was this whole situation. Was this really happening? Was she in the middle of some off-the-wall nightmare?
“If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you.”
She sighed and began to shiver uncontrollably. No, she wasn’t dreaming. It was all crazy, but very real.
“This is a joke, right? You’re just trying to scare me.” She half turned so that she could see his face again, look into his eyes, search for a spark of humor. “Hey, I promise. No more speeding, honest. I’ll be a good girl from now on. In fact, I’ll stay away from driving altogether and get myself a chauffeur. How about that?”
He didn’t seem to hear her, his eyes as opaque as ever. “Do you have any questions? Have you understood these rights I’ve just read you?”
She shook her head, feeling silly, and gripped her arms tightly around herself. “I don’t understand anything at all.”
His mouth twisted and he gestured toward her. “Hold your hands out behind your back.”
“What?”
The handcuffs were on before she knew what was happening, and she was so shocked she couldn’t utter a word.
“Let’s go.”
She turned to look at him, aghast. “But why?” she asked weakly, too stunned to fight for the moment. “What have I done?”
“Armed robbery, for starters.” He pointed her toward his car, and she went along in a fog of disbelief, his hand guiding her. “That was in Utah. Arizona said something about kidnapping. Colorado mentioned bunco. And then there was the little matter of a shooting in Laughlin, Nevada. Remember that one?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head, dazed. “No!” she repeated more loudly. She stopped, eyes blazing as her spirit revived. She was no criminal. There was a mistake being made. He had to listen to reason. It was silly, really, in a perverted sort of way. Surely he would see the joke if she just explained. “No, this is crazy,” she told him, shaking her head. “I’ve never done any of those things. I’ve never even been to Laughlin.”
“Get in the car.” He held open a door to the back seat.
She stared in at the interior of the car. It looked grotesquely lonely. He couldn’t do this. Could he? She started shaking her head again, backing away. “No, I…”
Reaching out, he gave her an encouraging push that brooked no argument or hesitation. She got in awkwardly, her hands stretched out behind her.
“Okay, wise guy,” she muttered, anger beginning to rise in her. “Okay,” she said more forcefully, turning to look at him, her cheeks bright with the humiliation. “If you think you know so much about me, tell me this. Who do you think I am?”
He flipped up a clipboard from the front seat and scanned it. “Billie Joe Calloway of Fort Worth, Texas,” he read off what he had clipped there. “Twenty-eight years old and good-looking. Five foot six with nice curves. Golden blond hair. Blue eyes. Driving a green Ford Mustang with California plates.” He dropped the clipboard and looked at her. “Now, doesn’t that sound familiar?” he asked her softly, his eyes as cold as an Arctic winter.
If it wasn’t so scary, the situation might have been funny. But right now it would be pretty hard to work up a real, honest laugh out of it.
“I’m thirty,” she said quickly. “And I’m not from Texas. Do you hear even one tiny hint of a Texas twang in. this voice?” But when you came right down to it, the rest fit her to a tee. “I’m not this Billie Joe person,” she said more strongly, glaring at him for emphasis. “You’ve got the wrong woman this time.”
She thought quickly. There had to be some way to prove it. Of all the times to lose her purse. “Oh, my car registration!”
He shrugged. “So you stole a car.”
“Oh, I see. No matter what I come up with, you’ll have a reason why it doesn’t apply.” She stared at him in exasperation. “You’re going to feel like such an idiot when you find out the truth.”
He shrugged again, seeming totally disinterested. “We’ll see,” he said as he swung into the driver’s seat.
“My car,” she protested, suddenly realizing they were going to drive off and leave it. “It’s just sitting there. Someone will take it.”
He turned and looked at her through the opening in the glass partition between the seats. “Don’t you get it?” he said, his voice soft but tough. “There is no one around, Miss Calloway. You took the wrong road, all right. You must have gone past three separate barriers to get this far. You were on a street to nowhere when I picked out your headlights and came on out here to see what was going on.” He started up his engine. “If you’d gone a mile farther, you’d have probably driven right off a cliff,” he added, sounding almost cheerful for once, “since you seem to have an opposite reaction to warning signs, or any other sort of rules or regulations.”
Cami turned slowly and looked back, squinting into the blurry white wilderness, dumbfounded. Was he right? She didn’t remember any barriers. So now she was supposed to consider him her savior instead of her enemy? It didn’t make any sense, but it served to keep her quiet as they rode down the mountain and turned onto a highway. She was thinking things over—and getting more and more puzzled all the time.
“My purse,” she murmured hopelessly at one point.
“The snow’s getting too deep to find it now,” he told her. “I’ll send someone out in the morning to look for it.”
She lapsed into silence again, overwhelmed by it all. She’d been in scrapes before. In fact, she’d been known by her friends as someone who seemed to attract trouble. She liked to think of it as trouble attracting her. And she usually had no problem in dealing with such things. But nothing in her background and experience had prepared her for this, and it was going to take some time to pull herself together and figure how to get out of this one.
“This is utterly outrageous,” she said, staring at his rock-hard profile. “You can’t just go around arresting people like this.”
“Sure I can,” he responded, glancing back at her. “It’s my job.”
Two (#ulink_d3ef0c44-7f0a-54ed-ab60-3a9877e7b76c)
Okay, so this was going to be a little more complicated than he’d thought. Rafe eased the car around the corner, wheels spinning in the snow, and avoided looking in the rearview mirror. With the storm coming in, he was probably going to be stuck with her for the night. Oh, well. It came with the job. And it had been so long since he’d arrested anyone, he’d almost forgotten how to do it.
“Here we are,” he said as the car slid to a stop beside the old adobe building. “Hold on a minute. I’ll get your door.”
He wasn’t being gallant, merely careful. With the rap sheet this lady carried in her background, he wasn’t going to take any chances. She was tougher than she looked—had to be, with the things she’d done lately. He held the door and watched her emerge awkwardly from the car, and then wished he hadn’t.
She had the longest damn legs he’d seen in some time. And what was she doing wearing a skirt up here in the mountains, anyway? Nobody wore skirts around here. And if she had to wear a skirt, why couldn’t she control it better? She didn’t have to let it hike halfway up like that.
He knew that was hardly fair. After all, she was still in handcuffs. Still, it made him feel better to complain, even silently. The way she moved did allow him to get a good look at some of the most beautiful legs he’d ever gawked at, but that wasn’t what he wanted to do—not at her. She was a suspect, for Pete’s sake. He wasn’t supposed to notice her legs, or anything else about her. It wasn’t professional. He swore at himself and looked away. No, this definitely was no cinch.
“We’ll go on in,” he told her, turning her and pointing her in the right direction. “We’ll get the proper forms filled out, and then we’ll call Santa Fe.” There was still a chance they would come on out and pick her up right away. It all depended on how badly they wanted her.
